


Eight After Eights

by bonn



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, does anyone in my world know how to play anything other that super smash bros? no, lily does emotional labour for james but in a good way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-23
Updated: 2017-07-23
Packaged: 2018-12-06 01:22:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11590095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonn/pseuds/bonn
Summary: Happy birthday, Jesus.Sorry your party's so lame.





	Eight After Eights

**Author's Note:**

> special love to rhiannon, grace and ria for reassuring me that this is okay and encouraging me through this x

The first time James asks her to spend Christmas with them, she’s apprehensive. She’s only known him for three months, and she really doesn’t even know that much about him _or_ Sirius. She says, “Yeah, maybe,” and his face twists into this awful, embarrassed thing.

“That sounded _so_ forward. I meant, if it comes down to it, two months from now, and you don’t have anywhere to go, you can spend it with me and Sirius.” He won’t embarrass her by saying that Sirius noticed how she went stiff in their Modern Art lecture yesterday when Mary MacDonald asked her about her family. He won’t say that it’s physically impossible for Sirius to keep something like that from him. He’s too _honourable_. She admires that about him. She admires a lot of things about him.

The second time he asks, he’s just gotten off the phone with his mum, and if she notices that his eyes are a little red as she scoots over to make room for him on the couch, she doesn’t say anything.

He watches them play _Super Smash Bros_ for two whole rounds before Sirius caves and says, “How are they?”

“Good, really good, yeah,” James says, but his voice is pitched just a little too high. Lily knows reaching over to squeeze his hand will make her gameplay suffer, but she does it anyway. He squeezes back, and then releases the hand to let her play. “They’re not, uh, not coming back this year. Dad’s really close to some breakthrough and taking off for a week or two would just be disastrous for the research team, and I can’t go out there, obviously, because that would still be a massive disruption and I don’t even want to go really and besides, we don’t even _actually_ celebrate Christmas, we only do it because everyone in this country does so it’s not that big of a deal so—” He takes a shaky breath.

Lily pauses the game. “You’re allowed to miss them, man.”

James stares off into space, and she can tell that he’s furiously trying to internalise his _no, I’m not, not like you are_ gut reaction. She’s used to that. “Yeah.” He takes another breath, and she just looks at him softly, gives him time to compose himself. No ulterior motives. “Looks like that’s sorted, then. We’re doing Christmas here,” he says finally. He doesn’t quite meet her eye when he says, “You’re most welcome to join us.”

Later, when he’s retreated to his room and she’s on her way back to the living room from the loo, she knocks softly on his door. She pushes it open before he has time to respond, and so she finds him laying on top of his covers, staring up at the ceiling. (She wishes she could say she’s never walked in on him wanking, but that’s her own fault for never waiting for an answer.)

He crosses an arm over his chest to make room for her, and they lay on his bed like that for a while. She tucks herself into him, and she puts a hand on his chest when it starts to shudder with the effort of holding his tears back.

“Hey,” she says softly. “Your parents are in _India_ , and you haven’t seen them in half a year. That’s so shitty, James. You can let yourself be upset about it.”

“Yours…” he starts, but she shakes her head.

“That doesn’t make it any less shit for you. The situations aren’t comparable. They _shouldn’t_ be comparable. They’re both awful. So please,” she looks up at him, and he draws his eyebrows together, “let go of whatever dumb emotional block your straight-boy mind has constructed to make you feel more manly. Please.”

She holds him as he cries, and Sirius has the decency not to ask when they emerge from his room together in the morning.

The third time he asks her, she’s sitting on the tube with a bottle of baileys and a box of crackers in her lap, and she picks up the phone even though she knows the reception is going to be shit.

“Are you on your way?” he asks.

“Yep,” she says.

“What?” he says.

“I’m on the tube.”

“What?”

She hangs up, because it’s easier. Because she’ll be seeing him in fifteen minutes anyway. Because she’s buzzing and talking on the phone just won’t cut it.

Sirius doesn’t even say hello to her, doesn’t say merry Christmas, doesn’t wish her well. He just takes the bottle of Baileys and goes back to the kitchen.

“I told him he couldn’t start drinking until you got here,” James says, as he takes her tote bag and shuts the door behind her. She doesn’t take her coat off, because the heating’s on the blink again and how were they supposed to find someone this close to the holidays? “His brother called to ask when he was arriving for lunch,” he whispers. “It’s put him in a rotten mood.”

Lily thinks of the missed call on her own phone. “I know the feeling.”

“Did Petunia call?” he asks. His eyebrows ask.

She shakes her head. “Nah.” He gives her one of his _looks_. “Someone equally as bad.” She shrugs off the look. "Happy Crimbo, Jimbo," she says.

"Fuck off," he says cheerfully.

“You better have mulled wine.”

He puts a hand to his chest in mock offence. “What do you think I _am_? Some kind of savage?”

“Put those under the tree,” she instructs, kicking the corner of the tote back with her boot.

“Evans, did you get us _presents_?” James grins.

Sirius materialises within seconds. “Presents?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Lily says. “But you can’t open them until after dinner.”

Turns out that what constitutes _after dinner_ is a little difficult to define when _dinner_ consists of seven glasses of mulled wine each, a bag of freezer chips, half a cold rotisserie chicken and a supermarket fruitcake, all eaten while watching _Christmas University Challenge_.

“You know James met Jeremy Paxman and he was so awestruck that he cried?” Sirius tells her, through a mouthful of chip sandwich.

“First of all,” says James, eyes not leaving the screen, “I was _eight_ , so jot that down. I was meeting my hero, I think I was entitled to a few tears. Secondly—”

“Your hero when you were eight was Jeremy Paxman?” Lily grins. “I’ve literally never been less surprised to learn anything.”

“ _Secondly_ ,” James says again, “shut up, I don’t want to miss a second of this.”

His ridiculously large knowledge of fucking _everything_ makes a whole lot more sense to her now. “Did you just like, see him on the street or was it a meet and greet? Give me details here.”

James just turns the volume up, so Sirius says, “Flea used to do science correspondence for the BBC a bit, so he called in a professional favour.”

“So Jeremy Paxman _knew_ you were a massive fan?”

James turns the volume up further. “I haven’t cried any of the other times I met him, but _yes_ when I was freshly eight and Dad told me we were going out for a _special birthday surprise_ and that surprise was _meeting Jeremy Paxman_ , I cried.”

“He remembers it, too.”

“Unless we’re commenting on how charismatic he is on screen this episode, we’re not talking about Jeremy Paxman anymore,” James says loudly.

Lily bites her lip to stop from laughing, and Jeremy Paxman shouts, “No, you mustn’t confer!” and James throws a pillow at Sirius.

“Gifts?” Sirius asks, the second it’s done, crouched in front of the tree. It’s been decorated in a style best described as _piss poor_. Lily’s quite proud of the picture of Ringo Starr on the top.

“Youngest first,” she says, and pats James on the head.

“That’s fucked,” Sirius objects, “I’m the oldest, I should get to go first.”

“Yeah,” says James, “he has the least time left, he needs to get things done quicker than me.”

“Oi!”

“ _Youngest first_ ,” Lily repeats. “That’s the way I do it, or I’m taking my gifts and going back to my place.”

“Fine,” Sirius says, and hands James Lily’s gift.

“Christ, Evans, what the fuck is this?” James asks, feeling around the present. It’s thin and square, and that’s really all he can make out from it. “Is it a piece of cardboard?”

“Fuck, you’re good at guessing,” Lily deadpans. “I know the bit you have shoved up in the loo window is almost soaked through, so I thought I’d save you the trouble of finding something else.”

He punches her in the arm, and Sirius starts a drumroll, which Lily imagines is probably the politest way he’s ever said _hurry the fuck up_ in his life.

When Lily looks back at James, he’s frozen with half the wrapping paper torn off. “You didn’t,” he says.

“I sure did,” she grins, and he pulls the gift fully free, and in three seconds, a life-sized cardboard cut-out of Spiderman is spread out on the floor. “I made sure it was Tom Holland,” she says, and the way he looks at her is so _soft_ and lovely. Like he can’t believe how lucky he is to have someone like her to buy him dumb gifts like this.

He makes them wait while he takes a selfie with it, and sends it to Peter along with a text that says something about a _one Peter limit in the flat_ , and then Lily opens a box full of tins of tuna from Sirius and James complains about not getting the joke.

Lily hands Sirius her present.

“This better not be a smaller, shitter cardboard cut-out of Tobey Maguire,” he says, and takes another sip of wine.

“Well, fuck,” Lily says.

“Jamesweneedarecordplayer,” Sirius says.

“Come again?” James frowns.

Sirius holds up the gift. “We need. A record player.”

“Evans you piece of shit,” James says. “ _Gasolina_? On _vinyl_? Why? Why do you hate me?”

“Look how happy he is,” Lily stage-whispers. And Sirius really _does_ look like a puppy who’s just been adopted.

“Fine,” James says. “Siri, you dickhead, what’d you get me?”

“I’ll give you your gift when we go to bed tonight,” Sirius says with a wink that gets itself confused with a blink halfway through.

“God, you are so drunk.”

“James,” Lily says gently, “we’re all _so drunk_.”

“That, Evans,” he yawns, “is an excellent point.” He reaches into his jacket pocket. “Here.”

He hands her a small velvety box. She thinks for a fleeting second that he’s asking her to _marry_ him which is absurd, because they aren’t even dating. _Yet_ , her mind supplies, unhelpfully.

It’s a key, which seems more ceremonial than anything, considering the door doesn’t actually lock. That soft look of his is back, and her heart swells. He doesn’t need to be told. He just knows. (He knows her).

“Just in case,” he whispers. “You’re always welcome here.”

The coffee table groans behind them.

“Happy birthday, Jesus,” Sirius says, with the bottle of Baileys held high, an early 20s toast. “Sorry your party’s so lame.”

Lily laughs, and throws a bauble at him. It bounces off his cheek and smacks down to the lino with a crunch that they collectively decide to worry about in the morning. “What do _you_ know about Jesus?” she asks him, and James snorts.

Lily finds the After Eights in the back of the pantry and scarfs eight of them on the run as Sirius chases her around the flat. James finally manages to tackle her, and Sirius piles on top of him. It’s a mess of limbs and laughter, and Lily thinks that maybe she could be happy here, with them.

With him.

**Author's Note:**

> xoxo gossip bonn


End file.
